The Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof, BGH) will create a new criminal panel on 1 July 2026 to handle mounting workloads.
Chairman Jürgen Schäfer, who heads the third criminal panel, told “Frankfurter Rundschau” in a recent interview that the new panel will be the BGH’s seventh criminal division.
In recent years the number of appeals has risen sharply: on average 3,100 verdicts were appealed per year before 2024, more than 3,700 cases were filed in 2024, and Schäfer expects around 3,900 appeals in 2025. The criminal panels must absorb a 26 % increase, while the civil panels have seen their case loads fall. The addition of a seventh panel is a response to this imbalance.
The new panel will not be based in the BGH’s headquarters in Karlsruhe. Because of the “Rutschklausel” agreed at German reunification in 1990, both the Federal Constitutional Court and the BGH are required to keep their main seats in Karlsruhe, but each new criminal panel must be located in Leipzig. The fifth panel was the first to be established in the east, and the sixth panel was added in 2020; the seventh panel will begin its work in Leipzig this year.
Schäfer also noted that the new panel will include six judges aside from the chair. Those judges currently hold positions in the civil division and will be reallocated to the criminal side.